The War Of The End Of The World - Mario Vargas Llosa [45]
“The Honorable Deputy Epaminondas Gonçalves cannot aid rebels,” the owner and editor-in-chief of the Jornal de Notícias said, again lingering over every syllable. “Nor can anyone connected with him, either closely or remotely. The Honorable Deputy is fighting an uphill battle for republican and democratic ideals in this autocratic enclave of powerful enemies, and cannot take such a risk.” He smiled, and Gall saw that he had a gleaming white, voracious set of teeth. “Then you entered the picture. The plan I’m proposing would never have occurred to me if it hadn’t been for that strange visit of yours day before yesterday. That was what gave me the idea, what made me think: ‘If he’s mad enough to call a public meeting in support of the rebels, he’ll be mad enough to take them rifles.’” He stopped smiling and spoke sternly. “In cases such as this, frankness is the best policy. You’re the only person who, if you’re discovered or captured, could in no way compromise me and my political friends.”
“Are you warning me that if I were captured I wouldn’t be able to count on you for help?”
“This time you’ve understood my meaning exactly,” Epaminondas Gonçalves said slowly and distinctly. “If your answer is no, I bid you good night, and forget that you’ve seen me. If it’s yes, let us discuss the fee.”
The Scotsman shifted position on his seat, a little wooden bench that creaked. “The fee?” he murmured, blinking.
“As I see it, you’re performing a service,” Epaminondas Gonçalves said. “I’ll pay you well for it, and promptly, I promise you, the moment you’re about to leave the country. But if you prefer to render this service ad honorem, out of idealism, that’s your business.”
“I’m going to take a stroll outside,” Galileo Gall said, rising to his feet. “I think better when I’m by myself. I won’t be long.”
On stepping outside the inn, he thought at first that it was raining, but it was merely spray from the waves. The capangas stepped aside to let him pass, and he smelled the strong, acrid odor of their pipes. There was a moon, and the sea, looking as though it were effervescent, was giving off a pleasant, salty smell that penetrated to his very vitals. Galileo Gall walked, amid the sand and the lonely boulders, to a little fort with a cannon aimed at the horizon. He thought to himself: “The Republic has as little strength in Bahia as the King of England beyond the Aberfoyle Pass in the days of Rob Roy Macgregor.” Faithful to his habit despite the chaotic pounding of his blood, he tried to view the situation objectively. Was it ethical for a revolutionary to conspire with a petty-bourgeois politician? Yes, if the conspiracy aided the jagunços. Could he be of help to the people in Canudos? Without false modesty, one who was a battle-hardened veteran of political struggles and had dedicated his life to revolution could help them when certain decisions had to be made and once the time came when they would be forced to fight. And, finally, the experience would be valuable if he passed it on to the world’s revolutionaries. It might well be that he would leave his bones to molder there in Canudos, but wasn’t such an end preferable to dying of illness or of old age? He walked back to the inn and, standing on the threshold of the room, said to Epaminondas Gonçalves: “I’m mad enough to do it.”
“Wonderful!” the politician answered Galileo Gall in English, caught up by his fervor, his eyes gleaming.
[V]
In his sermons, the Counselor had so often foretold how the forces of the Dog would come to seize him and put the city to the sword that no one in Canudos was surprised when it was learned, from pilgrims come on horseback from Juazeiro, that a company of the Ninth Infantry Battalion from Bahia had arrived in the vicinity, charged with the mission of capturing the saint.
Prophecies were beginning to come true, words becoming facts. The news had a tonic effect, mobilizing old people, young people, men,